Do you have too many clothes, or is your closet too small?

Today I helped a client with purging her wardrobe… only we didn’t.

We started off discussing her goals.  She wanted to purge her clothes because she felt she had too many.

She explained to me that she had already gone through all her clothes and what was left were the clothes that she loved.  So what was left for us to do?  She had clothes in two different sizes due to weight gain and wanted to keep all of them.  She also needed access to clothes for all seasons because she travels to different countries in various climates.

I asked her: are there any clothes that were duplicates that we could purge? No.  I asked if there were any clothes that did not fit or feel right on her body? No.  I asked if any were dated that needed to go? No.  And so it went.

My next approach was to ask about storing her out of season clothes in another closet, but one that she could still access. My idea was to put the clothes that did not fit in the closets into storage.  She was open to that, but she still had the problem of the clothes that fit her body not fitting into her very small closet.

So I put on my coaching hat and asked away:

  • Q: What is your main frustration (A: not being able to see my clothes)
  • Q: What is the possibility of combining all the clothes that fit you into this one closet? (A: not possible)
  • Q: What is the possibility of fitting all the clothes you need for this season into the one closet? (A: that’s possible but it would be tight and I would have challenges getting to the other items in the closet)
  • Q: Would you be open to investing in a wardrobe cabinet, like one from IKEA?  (A: yes!)

By the end of our conversation we determined that she did not have too many clothes—she had too little space to hold them!  I discussed the IKEA wardrobe and what kind of design she needed to accommodate her folded and hanging clothes and maybe even some shoes.

Her frustration was with trying to “see” her clothes in her small closet and that’s the reason why she felt she had too many and needed to purge. Together, we found a creative solution to solve her problem. It wasn’t the solution I thought we would be working on, but it was a fun challenge. I loved helping her figure out what was best for her and her needs.

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